Authors: Eve LaPlante
The Reverend Peter added, “We are not satisfied in her repentance, in that she lays her imprisonment to be the cause of all her errors, as
if
she were innocent before.”
“I cannot but reverence and adore the wise hand of God in this thing,” intoned the Reverend Wilson. Inferring the wishes and aims of God, he said, “I look at her as a dangerous instrument of the Devil, raised up by Satan amongst us to raise up divisions and contentions, and to take away hearts and affections one from another.” Echoing Dudley’s words in November attributing all of the colony’s troubles to her, the minister said, “Whereas there was much love and union and sweet agreement amongst us before she came, yet since [then] all union and love hath been broken, and there hath been censurings and judgings and condemnings one of another. And I do conceive
all
these woeful opinions do come from
this bottom,
for if the bottom hath been unsound and corrupt, then must the building be such. And the misgovernment of this woman’s tongue hath been a great cause of this disorder, which hath been to set up
herself
and to draw disciples after
her.
And therefore, she says one thing today and another thing tomorrow, whereas we should speak the truth plainly. Woe be to that soul that shall build upon such bottoms! Our souls should
abhor
and loathe to come so far short in repentance…. Therefore, I leave it to the church to consider how safe it is to suffer so erroneous and so schismatical and
so unsound a member amongst us, the congregation of the Lord. Therefore, consider whether we shall be faithful to Jesus Christ, or whether it can stand with his honor to suffer such a one any longer amongst us. If the blind lead the blind, whither shall we go? Consider whether we may longer suffer her to go on still in
seducing to seduce
and in
deceiving to deceive
and in
lying to lie
and in condemning authority and magistrate. Therefore, we should sin against God if we should not put away from us so evil a woman, guilty of such foul evils!”
In the minds of the men, her “lie” was her recantation, which they judged to be false. As John Winthrop wrote later, some of her remarks were “circumlocutions, and seemed to lay all the faults to her expressions…. And this she affirmed with such confidence as bred great astonishment in many, who had known the contrary, and diverse alleged her own sayings and reasonings, both before her confinement and since,
which did manifest to all that were present that she knew that she spake untruth.
”
In the meetinghouse, Thomas Oliver, saddened by the lengthy speeches adumbrating Hutchinson’s perceived evils, said, “I did not think the church would have come thus far so soon, especially seeing [that] when I talked with her [this morning] I saw her come so freely in her confession of her sin in condemning magistrates and ministers.”
The Reverend Eliot countered, “It is a wonderful wisdom of God to let them fall by that whereby they have upheld their opinions,…for she hath carried on all her errors by lies, as that she held nothing but what Mr. Cotton did, and that he and she was all one in judgment.”
“The matter is now translated,” John Cotton said, meaning it was now settled. Still, he preferred not to be the man who cast out the “notorious liar” Anne Hutchinson. Someone else would have to so cleanse the First Church of Jesus Christ at Boston. Cotton noted that the week before she had been “dealt with [by me] in point of doctrine. Now she is dealt with in point of practice, and so it belongs to the pastor’s office.”
Before letting his brother Wilson do the deed, Cotton again justified himself. “I know not how to satisfy myself in it but according to that in Revelation 22:15,” which reads, “For without [outside the community of God] are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolators, and whosoever loves and makes a lie.” Cotton continued, “Though she has confessed that she sees many of the things
which she held to be errors, and that it proceeded from the root pride of spirit, yet I see this pride of heart is not healed but is working still. God hath let her fall into a manifest lie—yea, to
make
a lie—and therefore as we received her in amongst us, I think we are bound upon this ground to remove her from us, and not to retain her any longer, seeing she doth prevaricate in her words, as that her judgment is one thing and her expression is another.”
In Cotton’s view, according to a letter he wrote two years later, the form of excommunication required in such a case as Hutchinson’s was among the most severe: “The greatest censure, of anathema
maranatha,
that is, for Mistress Hutchinson,” who showed “pertinacity and obstinacy against Christ Jesus.” The phrase “anathema
maranatha
” comes from the apostle Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians 16:22, “If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema,
maranatha,
” meaning he should be rejected by God’s church and delivered to Satan.
In the meetinghouse, Davenport supported Cotton by saying, “God will not bear with mixtures in this kind.” Davenport turned to Hutchinson. “Therefore,” he said, “you must freely confess the truth, take shame to yourself that God may have the glory, and I fear that God will not let you see your sin and confess it till the ordinance of God hath taken place against you. It seems to me God hath a purpose to go on in the course of his judgment against you.”
One final supporter of hers rose. The shoemaker Richard Scott, husband of her youngest sister, Katherine, had traveled to America with the Hutchinson family in 1634. He said, “I desire to propound this one scruple, which keeps me that I cannot so freely in my spirit give way to excommunication. Whether it were not better to give her a little time to consider of these things because she is not yet convinced of her lie, and so is in distraction, and she cannot recollect her thoughts.”
Cotton was not moved. “This now is not for point of doctrine, wherein we must suffer her with patience, but we now deal with her in point of fact or practice, as the making and holding of a lie,” by which, he felt, she had deceived him and many others. “Now there may be a present proceeding.”
The Reverend Shepard said, “I perceive it is the desire of many of the brethren to stay her excommunication, and to let a second admonition lie upon her.” But, he countered, with one who maintains her course
of lies before God and the congregation, it would not be “for the honor of God and the honor of this church to bear with patience so
gross
an offender.”
The Reverend Mather, who had spoken just once before, invoked the apostle Paul’s letter to Titus 3:10. “The Apostle says, an heretic, after once or twice admonition, reject [him] and cut [him] off like a gangrene.” The Dorchester minister pointed at Hutchinson. “Now, she hath been once admonished already. Why then should not the church proceed?”
At this point, a man identified as a stranger spoke. “I would desire to know, if the church proceeds against her, whether it be for doctrine or for her lie. If for her lie, then I consent. If it be for her doctrine, she hath renounced that as erroneous.”
The Reverend Wilson answered the stranger. “For my part, if the church proceeds, I think it is and it should be for her errors in opinion as well as for point of practice, for though she hath made some show of repentance, yet it doth not
seem
to be cordial and sincere.” Looking around the meetinghouse, Wilson announced, “The church consenting to it, we will proceed to excommunication.” He paused, considering his words, now that the process of cleansing the church was almost complete.
“Forasmuch as you, Mistress Hutchinson, have highly transgressed and offended, and forasmuch as you have
so
many ways troubled the church with your errors, and have drawn away many a poor soul, and have upheld your revelations, and forasmuch as you have made a lie. Therefore, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and in the name of the church, I do not only pronounce you worthy to be cast out, but I do cast you out! And in the name of Christ, I do deliver you up to Satan, that you may learn no more to blaspheme, to seduce, and to lie!”
Thus condemned to Satan, Hutchinson may have heard certain words that her father had recited to her running through her head. “I am to go whither it pleases God,” was the Reverend Marbury’s final statement to the Court of High Commission. “But remember God’s judgments. You do me open wrong. I pray God forgive you.”
John Wilson was still shouting, “And I do account you from this time forth to be a heathen and a publican”—a reference to the Gospel of Matthew 18:15–17, “If thy brother shall trespass against thee,…tell it unto the church: and if he refuse to hear the church also, let him be
unto thee as an heathen man, and a publican”—“and so to be held of all the brethren and sisters of this congregation and of others. Therefore, I command you in the name of Christ Jesus and of this church as a leper to
withdraw yourself out of the congregation!
That as formerly you have despised and condemned the holy ordinances of God and turned your back on them, so you may now have no part in them nor benefit by them!”
Anne Hutchinson had the same reaction as four months earlier, when during his sermon the Reverend Wilson had commanded her to depart the assembly. Holding her head high, she stood, turned, and walked swiftly to the meetinghouse door. Now she took the proffered hand of her friend Mary Dyer, whom she had aided after her difficult birth. A group of Anne’s supporters, shrunken by the many banishments, disfranchisements, and voluntary exiles from the colony, clustered around the rude wooden door that led out to the late-winter light.
John Winthrop watched his neighbor and rival stand at the door, a middle-aged woman, six months pregnant, pale and weak. It seemed to him that even now she reveled in her state.
If she seemed proud, and doubtless she did, it may have been because her mind tended toward passages such as 1 Samuel 16:7: “But the Lord said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.”
Winthrop was unaware, as he watched Mistresses Hutchinson and Dyer in the rear of the meetinghouse, of the events in October that had followed Dyer’s stillbirth. Within a week, however, word of the “monster” that Dyer had borne—and that Hutchinson and Hawkins, with Cotton’s support, had secretly buried—would reach the governor, horrifying him. He had always admired the charming and attractive young Mary Dyer, but now she seemed “of a very proud spirit,” “much addicted to revelations,” and “notoriously infected with Mistress Hutchinson’s errors.” Of the Dyer baby, he would report in his journal:
It was so monstrous and misshapen as the like that scarce been heard of. It had no head but a face, which stood so low upon the breast, as the ears, which were like an ape’s, grew upon the shoulders.
The eyes stood far out, so did the mouth. The nose was hooking upward. The breast and back was full of sharp prickles, like a thornback [an ocean dweller with thornlike spines]. The navel and all the belly with the distinction of the sex were where the lower part of the back and hips should have been, and those back parts were on the side the face stood.
The arms and hands, with the thighs and legs, were as other children’s, but instead of toes it had upon each foot three claws, with talons like a young fowl. Upon the back above the belly it had two great holes, like mouths, and in each of them stuck out a piece of flesh.
It had no forehead, but in the place thereof, above the eyes, four horns, whereof two were above an inch long, hard, and sharp.
The infant’s condition is consistent with a severe birth anomaly, anencephaly, the partial or total absence of the brain, according to modern medical experts. The horns, talons, and prickles are, however, embellishment.
“Many things were observable in the birth and discovery of this monster,” the governor would note. The Dyers were “Familists, and very active in maintaining their party. The midwife, one Hawkins’ wife, of St. Ives, was notorious for familiarity with the Devil, and is now a prime Familist. This monster was concealed by three persons about five months.” Intimating a communal revulsion like that later associated with the witches of Salem Village, Winthrop reported that most women present at the birth “were suddenly taken with such a violent vomiting, as they were forced to go home, others had their children taken with convulsions, and so were sent home, so as none were left at the time of the birth but the midwife and two others, whereof one fell asleep. At such time as the child died, the bed where in the mother lay shook so violently, as all in the room perceived it.”
Learning of the birth, Winthrop would order that Mistress Hawkins be questioned and the corpse exhumed. “The child was taken up” from its grave, he reported, “and though it was much corrupted, yet the horns and claws and holes in the back and some scales were found and seen of above a hundred persons.”
The governor would continue to be troubled that such a “proper and comely woman” as Mistress Dyer had given birth to something so grotesque. Looking back to the previous fall, he would recall the October day of the birth. It was the Sunday on which his trusted friend, the Reverend John Wilson of the Boston church, had called Anne Hutchinson out of that church for her “monstrous” and “notorious” errors and commanded her to depart the assembly. When Mistress Hutchinson had walked out, who had accompanied her? It was Mary Dyer, who only hours later gave birth. Monstrous errors beget monstrous births.
Now, just as Mistress Hutchinson was again about to depart this meetinghouse, one of her supporters called out to her, “The Lord sanctify this unto you!”
Winthrop stared as she turned back to face him and all the other magistrates, church elders, and even her former teacher. The governor was struck that “her spirits, which seemed before to be somewhat dejected, revived again, and she gloried in her sufferings.”